


Delicate Man

by Ladycat



Category: Stargate Atlantis
Genre: Episode: s04e16 Trio, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Pre-Slash
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-02-11
Updated: 2014-02-11
Packaged: 2018-01-12 00:32:24
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,162
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1179783
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ladycat/pseuds/Ladycat
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sheppard gave him a look. "Do you want to go on hurting?"</p>
            </blockquote>





	Delicate Man

The thing about rope-burns was that everyone oohed and awwed and made other various, annoying noises over the raw, bleeding gashes that were now his palms. Those got lathered with ointment and bandages and both of those things were really very good. Rodney supported them whole-heartedly.

The problem was that rope-burns didn't just burn the palm, but the fingers as well. Those didn't get soothed with ointment or clucked over by a still-strangely attentive Dr. Keller. Those were ignored almost entirely, even by Rodney himself, until he'd tried to turn his laptop on.

The _stabbing, agonizing pain_ made him white out for a second or two.

"Hey, McKay, did you—"

Sheppard never asked when he barged into Rodney's room. To be perfectly fair, which Rodney wasn't and didn't want to be no matter how many times the thought re-presented itself in his brain, Rodney did the same to Sheppard. But it was unnerving the way the man chose the exact _worst_ times to decide to forgo the concept of boundaries and personal space and tromp through Rodney's life.

"Wow. Carter really wasn't kidding." Sheppard approached slowly, circling around like Rodney was a spooked, skittish animal of some kind. "How's it feel to be that manly?"

"I'm always that manly," he snapped and it had to be the painkillers mixed with the watery excuse for beer they bargained for, because there was no other reason for his voice to waver like that. There just wasn't.

It really _hurt_ , though. His fingers felt like huge, throbbing sausages, hot enough that Rodney thought he could almost feel it radiating against his cheeks. Which didn't make any sense, but he could still feel it and why the hell did Sheppard have to stand so close? He would have to turn on the air conditioner soon, trapped as he was between the steady nauseating pulse and the way Sheppard was just _leaning_ towards him, too tall and too broad and too _there_ , looking over his shoulder.

"This looks pretty bad," Sheppard understated. Or was it overstating? Sheppard was the original _shake it off, McKay, it's just a flesh wound_ so if he thought it was bad...

Rodney had no idea what that meant.

Brusque, he snapped, "It wasn't what I consider to be a good time, no." Not that that made _sense_ , since as far as most of his missions went, this one had been a cake-walk. He got to be sweaty and manly with two beautiful women who hadn't smacked him, well, at least not more than the normal verbal slapping Rodney was used to, and things like that just didn't happen to him. He'd been the _hero_. That was supposed to be a good time, right?

For a second, he considered asking Sheppard what it felt like when he was so often the hero. He didn't ask, though. He was pretty sure he didn't want to hear the answer.

"C'mere." Sheppard never said 'come here' to him. It was always 'c'mere', like he was a favored dog, or something. One day, Sheppard was going to actually pat his thigh when he said it, and then Rodney was going to have to kill him. "On the bed, McKay."

What? Blinking, Rodney squinted over towards the bed, where Sheppard was fiddling with a variety of bottles. "Why?"

Sheppard gave him a look. "Do you _want_ to go on hurting?"

Well, no. No he didn't. Standing took a little more effort than he was expecting—alcohol and painkillers, whoohoo—and he stumbled right before reaching the bed. Sheppard caught him on his downward pitch, carefully making sure he didn't jostle Rodney's arms as he was sat more firmly on the bed.

"The thing about doctors," Sheppard said conversationally as he stripped Rodney's shirt off, too fast and too competent for Rodney to do more than think _what the hell?_ , "is that they see bleeding wounds and pretty much forget about everything else."

"Huh?" Oh, yes, he was being intelligent tonight.

Sheppard didn't seem to mind, flashing him an oddly shy grin even as he carefully tugged Rodney's right arm into his lap. A bottle of Rodney's arnica gel was turned upside down, a slithering snake of bubble-filled clear gel poured into his palm. "I mean, they're probably pretty bad," Sheppard continued. "Rope burns are always messy, and the risk of infection is higher from all the fibers that get lodged into the skin."

"Uh." Rodney said. Staring.

Because Sheppard was frowning, entire faced turned into a mass of focused, down-turned lines as he carefully began working the gel into each of Rodney's fingers. His touch was light, cognizant that it was going to hurt, but firm enough that meant he wasn't going to let Rodney pull away, smoothing over skin that flared in entirely new ways in his wake.

"But those are just cuts and they heal," Sheppard said quietly. "It's the pulled muscles that hurt longest. Everything aches and your skin feels too tight and since the doctors can't see it, sometimes they forget about it."

Sheppard's fingers were long, dusted with dark hair, but still incredibly pale against the pink-red of Rodney's skin. Rodney stared at the nails that were cut nearly to the quick, the awkward bend in Sheppard's right pointer: they weren't attractive hands. No AllState commercials in his future.

But those awkward, unattractive fingers moved in a delicate, wave-like motion that Rodney could feel down to his core, and when Sheppard shifted, getting a better angle for him to work up the length of Rodney's arm, thumbs pressing whitened indentations into muscles he hadn't even realized were hurting, Rodney couldn't help but moan.

He flushed bright red afterward. Here Sheppard was—was _touching_ him, doing something nice for him unasked for and unprompted. Rodney shouldn't ruin it, because the idea of boundaries was something neither of them thought about until suddenly it was _all_ they—or at least he—could think about.

Rodney knew Sheppard's boundaries. He did. Sheppard liked being one of the guys and within that very specific subset, certain things were allowable. The way Sheppard was gently prodding him to shift his weight, allowing Sheppard better access to his shoulder-cuff—that just wasn't within acceptable limits. It wasn't.

But Rodney still let his arm go completely loose, hissing as Sheppard found each and every screamingly sore muscle.

"The door's locked, right?" Sheppard asked. He squeezed out more gel, trailing his fingers along the back of Rodney's neck before starting on the other side.

Rodney wasn't sure when it'd become so _quiet_ —everything felt hushed, like he was caught in the middle of a snow-drift, muffled from the rest of the world—but the sudden click of the door locking was louder than he expected.

"Hey, hey, no jumping, you'll make it worse," Sheppard said. He flashed Rodney another one of those dark, vulnerable smiles before leaning down and kissing the inside of Rodney's wrist.

 _Oh,_ Rodney thought, and let him.


End file.
